It's the one physical disability it's still all right to talk about.
Even at holiday gatherings, where you have to avoid controversy, you can talk about this affliction.
Lately, with the popularity of public officials sporting beards – the vice president even has one – you can't help noticing the vast difference between the good and the bad.
I'm talking about the whisker-impaired, the follically-challenged, the heartbreak of a chin as smooth as a baby's backside. It's a cruel condition that strikes some men regardless of mental prowess, physical strength or popular fashion. It can happen to anyone.
I'm talkin' whiskers, folks.
Some men got 'em. Some don't. The examples – I'll get to some below – of men who don't got 'em are manifold.
And as I write this today, despite my bare-chin appearance in the picture that usually runs with this column, I'm one guy who's GOT 'EM.
No brag. Just fact.
Given a couple weeks, I could prove it. Except for one reason:
My wife won't let me.
Way back in my salad days as a young reporter, I walked into my boss's office and asked, “Mr. Allbaugh, can I grow a beard?”
“I don't know,” he replied. “Got 'ny whiskers?”
With that apparent permission, I went on to grow a full beard, lush, prolific, a wonder to behold. In fact, an award-winning beard.
You might think this is the boasting of a man “of a certain age,” recalling long-past glories that don't stand up to scrutiny. But I can back it up, and even cite a picture that ran on the Associated Press wire in 2003, as proof of my whisker-growing prowess.
That year, in an attempt to make their officers more relatable to the people of North Platte, Nebraska, the police department announced a beard-growing contest for its officers. Best beard, as judged by local celebrities, would win dinner for two at a Mexican restaurant.
“Can I enter?” I asked the police chief. “Can I compete for best beard?” He said yes, figuring the local editor's image could use some sprucing up as well.
Long story short, in just a couple weeks of cultivation, I skunked the whole police department. It was a slam-dunk. Not even close. A humiliation of the local constabulary.
“Woof, woof, WOOF!” I was prone to saying as it became clear that nobody in the department stood a chance of beating me. It was a thing of beauty, and after a local TV news lady/judge ran her fingers through my beard, I was named the winner. The AP ran a picture of me and my award-winning effort, surrounded by the woeful also-rans of the North Platte PD.
You could look it up.
With this background, I feel qualified to weigh in on the current state of the beards sported by public figures.
The aforementioned Vice President J.D. Vance has a workmanlike beard, well trimmed, and what it lacks in fulsomeness, it makes up for in tidiness. Soup won't get caught up in the VP's beard.
Mike Huckabee, former governor of Arkansas and current ambassador to Israel, has a truly impressive beard, prolific, luxurious, in every way an impressive undertaking, masterfully played. Simply put, his beard is what lesser men aspire to, but seldom achieve.
Asked to comment on his all-white beard, Huckabee said he was “trying to get a job as a department store Santa.”
Compare that to the abject failure of Rep. Eric Swalwell of California, whose beard looks like a guy who cleaned his chimney and forgot to wash his face afterwards. His beard is pitiful, half-baked, and callow. He looks like a guy who, in the words of my late father, “didn't stand close enough to the razor this morning.”
Almost as bad is the whisker-growing crop failure of Rep. Chris Murphy of Connecticut, who has failed to progress much beyond the preliminary, dirty-face stage of facial hair horticulture.
If my wife would only let me, I could demonstrate my whisker-growing ability, going the full Grizzly Adams of my youth, or even ZZ Top/Garden Gnome with my beard.
But, it's not to be.
As the vice president said in explaining the beard his wife likes, “Happy wife, happy life.”
Works the other way, too. My wife figures my beard today, given my gray hair, would be far less Grizzly Adams in appearance.
And far more Boxcar Willie.
So, sadly, I'm left on the sidelines, with only memories of days gone by, and former glories.
Kind of sad.
Dave Simpson can be reached at: DaveSimpson145@hotmail.com
